Eagles activate Jordan Davis, place CJGJ on injured reserve

The Philadelphia Eagles officially announced three roster moves ahead of their Week 13 game against the Tennessee Titans. An overview:

• DT Jordan Davis was activated from injured reserve to the active roster.
• S C.J. Gardner-Johnson was placed on injured reserve.
• LB Christian Elliss was temporarily elevated from the practice squad.

Let’s sort through this news on a player-by-player basis.

JORDAN DAVIS

The Eagles activated the 21-day practice window for Davis earlier this week. It wasn’t perfectly clear until now if he was going to be ready to play against the Titans but the sense seemed to be more optimistic than not.

Davis is returning from an ankle injury that caused him to miss four games on IR. This is the earliest possible week he could return. The Eagles are getting him back at a good time as they try to shut down a Titans rushing attack led by one of the NFL’s best running backs in Derrick Henry.

It will be interesting to see what Philly’s defensive tackle looks like on Sunday. Is Davis going to be without limitations or do they ease him back in? Even if he is fully healthy, how will the Eagles manage giving snaps to five other players at his position in Fletcher Cox, Javon Hargrave, Linval Joseph, Ndamukong Suh, and Milton Williams?

Regardless, the Eagles are better equipped to stop the run with Davis around. The team is excited to get their 2022 first-round pick back on the field in some capacity.

C.J. GARDNER-JOHNSON

The Eagles opened up a roster spot for Davis by putting CJGJ on IR.

CJGJ suffered a lacerated kidney in Week 12. The nature of his injury makes a timeline for his recovery not so easy to nail down. But the NFL’s interception leader will miss at least the next four games while on IR. Those are as follows:

• Week 13 vs. Tennessee Titans
• Week 14 at New York Giants
• Week 15 at Chicago Bears
• Week 16 at Dallas Cowboys

CJGJ will be eligible to return for the Eagles’ Week 17 home game against the New Orleans Saints (his former team, naturally) at the very earliest. We’ll see if he’s healed up by then.

In the meantime, undrafted rookie free agent Reed Blankenship is set to start across from Marcus Epps at safety. K’Von Wallace figures to be the first guy off the bench while Andre Chachere is also around.

CHRISTIAN ELLISS

The Eagles elevating Elliss likely has to do with them trying to tweak their special teams configuration after allowing the Green Bay Packers to have too much success on kickoffs last week. Now that Elliss is going to be playing, problem solved!

Well, probably not. But changing some of the personnel is probably worth a shot.